The book consists of excerpts from interviews of senior members of State College Friends Meeting. The narrators who lived through the Great Depression tell of their difficult childhoodand yet in most cases one they regarded as happy. Some of the conscientious objectors during WWII tell of life in CPS camps; others speak of using nonviolent methods with mental patients, while still others relate the story of the human guinea experiments some of them participated in. Of those who did relief work after the war overseas, probably the most exciting tales are told by the four who worked with the Friends Ambulance Unit in China. They happened to be located close to where the Nationalists and the Communists were fighting.

The book consists of excerpts from interviews of senior members of State College Friends Meeting. The narrators who lived through the Great Depression tell of their difficult childhood--and yet in most cases one they regarded as happy. Some of the conscientious objectors during WWII tell of life in CPS camps; others speak of using nonviolent methods with mental patients, while still others relate the story of the human guinea experiments some of them participated in. Of those who did relief work after the war overseas, probably the most exciting tales are told by the four who worked with the Friends Ambulance Unit in China. They happened to be located close to where the Nationalists and the Communists were fighting.

The Sino-Japanese War (1937–45) had a devastating impact on China’s civilian population. Braving bandits, disease, and dangerous roads, the China Convoy – a Quaker-sponsored humanitarian unit – delivered medical supplies and provided famine relief in the unoccupied territory of “Free China” and later to both sides in the ensuing civil war. China Gadabouts examines the contested roles played by Western and Chinese nurses in the Convoy’s humanitarian efforts from 1941 to 1951. In so doing, it re-examines the quandaries of Quakers’ purportedly apolitical global engagement that remain salient for contemporary humanitarians. Susan Armstrong-Reid explores how this work gave meaning to the women’s lives and how they attempted to carve out personal and professional space despite a chaotic, unfamiliar, and occasionally hostile environment. China Gadabouts illuminates the ethical dilemmas, professional challenges, and opportunities presented by humanitarian nursing within a Western-based relief organization, while acknowledging its contentious imperial role. In doing so, it spotlights an understudied area of global nursing – its role within INGOs, now more active than ever in global health care.